Subordinate financialization and housing finance: the case of indexed mortgage loans? coalition in Argentina

Abstract

Housing financialization research has aimed at explaining the links between financial macrodynamics and urban phenomena. But as this article argues, a focus on the Global South’s variegated trajectories demands both a consideration of the effects of the subordinate character of financialization in these economies and an attentive look at the changing coalitions pushing for new financial reforms. In this article, I take the case of an urban–financial coalition in Argentina responsible for setting up a new housing finance system revolving around inflation indexed mortgage loans. By looking at developers’ associations’ key role in coproducing consensus over indexed loans despite hyperinflation, I highlight the importance of studying the stability of the coalition to better comprehend housing financialization and the contradictions arising when attempting to subsume housing credit to the logic of finance capital—that is, creating a financialized financial infrastructure—in unstable financialized economies. The findings of this article are based on a macroanalysis of the major transformations in the real estate and financial sectors in Argentina and a microanalysis of developers’ collective action.